What Remains in the Water

The baseball sat on the mantelpiece, gathering dust alongside the urn that held what remained of Jack. Three years since the accident, and Elena still couldn't bring herself to move either of them. The ball—signed by some minor league player Jack had worshipped as a kid—represented everything she'd loved about him: his childlike enthusiasm, his ability to find joy in small things, his stubborn belief that life was fundamentally good.

She ran her fingers through her hair, now silver at the temples, and remembered how Jack used to say he'd love her even when she was old and gray. He'd never gotten the chance to prove it.

The community pool below her balcony was empty this time of year, its cover sagging with accumulated rainwater. Summer had been their season. Jack would cannonball into the deep end while she watched from a lounge chair, pretending to read but actually watching the way the water slicked back his dark hair, the way he surfaced grinning like he'd just invented happiness. They'd met at that pool—she'd been the lifeguard, he'd been the guy who kept diving too close to the designated lanes just to make her blow the whistle.

Last winter, he'd taken a job in Alaska guiding tourists. "Think about it, El," he'd said over Skype, his face pixelated but radiant. "I could see a bear. A real one. Not just in pictures." She'd begged him not to go. Something about it felt wrong—like a premonition she couldn't shake. But Jack had never been able to resist the promise of adventure.

The avalanche report said it was instant. She tried to find comfort in that.

Now spring was coming again, and with it would come the pool's opening day. She'd watched the maintenance crew checking the filters this morning, seen them testing the water chemistry. Another season without him. Another summer of other people's joyous splashes, other couples' careless laughter, while she sat with his baseball and his ashes and wondered how the world kept spinning when hers had stopped.

The bear. She'd never told anyone about the dream that came after his death—a massive grizzly standing at the foot of her bed, its fur matted with snow, something tender and devastating in its dark eyes. It had reached out with one massive paw, and she'd understood somehow that it was Jack. Or something like him. Something wild and beautiful and gone too soon.

Elena placed the baseball in her pocket and walked downstairs to the pool. The cover was still on, but she could smell the chlorine even through the winter's accumulation. She'd swim this summer. She'd cannonball into the deep end and surface grinning, because that's what he would have wanted. And maybe, just maybe, she'd feel him in the water beside her, wild and beautiful and somehow still hers.